Adoption rights for gays is tantamount to â€˜child abuse’, says the Catholic Church

STILL reeling from a double blow received this week at the hands of legislators on both sides of the Atlantic, the Catholic Church has hit back, claiming “hostility towards religion”.

The first blow came when the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld an “anti-Catholic” resolution by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, condemning the Vatican’s interference in the city’s affairs.

The resolution – adopted on March 21, 2006 – was a response by the Board to orders issued by the Vatican instructing Catholic charities to break the law and treat prospective adoptive parents on a discriminatory basis according to whether or not the couples were heterosexual or homosexual.

Cardinal Levada

The resolution formally called on Cardinal William Levada:

In his capacity as head of the Congregation for the doctrine of Faith at the Vatican, to withdraw his discriminatory and defamatory directive that Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of San Francisco stop placing children in need of adoption with homosexual households.

Cardinal Levada was described in the resolution as being:

A decidedly unqualified representative … of the people of San Francisco and the values they hold dear.

The resolution called the directive:

An insult to all San Franciscans when a foreign country, like the Vatican, meddles with and attempts to negatively influence this great City’s existing and established customs and traditions such as the right of same-sex couples to adopt and care for children in need.

The resolution viewed a claim from the Vatican that, “allowing children to be adopted by persons living in [homosexual] unions would actually mean doing violence to these children” as defamatory in nature and “absolutely unacceptable to the citizenry of San Francisco.”

The Board said such defamatory language was:

Insulting and callous, and shows a level of insensitivity and ignorance which has seldom been encountered by this Board of Supervisors.

And the board defended the right of same-sex parents to care for their children as equal to that of heterosexual couples.

According to this report, the failed legal challenge to the resolution was mounted by the Thomas More Law Centre, a national Christian legal advocacy group based on behalf of the Catholic League and two Catholic residents of San Francisco.

Said Richard Thompson, President and Chief Counsel of the Centre:

The policy of San Francisco is one of totalitarian intolerance of Christians of all denominations who oppose homosexual conduct. My concern is that if this ruling is allowed to stand, it will further embolden anti-Christian attacks.

The lawsuit claimed that the City’s anti-Catholic resolution violated the First Amendment, which:

Forbids an official purpose to disapprove of a particular religion, religious beliefs, or of religion in general.

Robert Muise, the Law Centre attorney who argued the case, stated:

Our constitution plainly forbids hostility toward any religion, including the Catholic faith. In total disregard for the Constitution, homosexual activists in positions of authority in San Francisco have abused their authority as government officials and misused the instruments of the government to attack the Catholic Church. Their egregious abuse of power now has the backing of a federal circuit court. This decision must be reversed â€¦

The Law Centre argued that:

The Anti-Catholic resolution sends a clear message to plaintiffs and others who are faithful adherents to the Catholic faith that they are outsiders, not full members of the political community, and an accompanying message that those who oppose Catholic religious beliefs, particularly with regard to homosexual unions and adoptions by homosexual partners, are insiders, favored members of the political community.

In the UK, meanwhile, the Charity Tribunal has ruled that Catholic adoption societies which refuse to offer children to homosexual couples face closure.

According to Catholic Action, judges ruled in a test case that the charities, which find homes for hundreds of children each year, will be breaking the law if they refuse to accept same-sex couples as adoptive parents.

An appeal lodged by the Catholic Care charity, run by the diocese of Leeds, said that the right to discriminate against homosexual couples was “a principle of a Catholic organisation”.

Following the ruling a spokesman for the diocese said:

As the charities cannot provide unrestricted services without being in breach of their obligations to act in accordance with the tenets of the Roman Catholic Church, it seems likely that the charities will need to close their adoption services and a flagship service of the charities will be lost. We are concerned about the possible impact this will have on potential adoptive parents and children.

Tribunal president Alison McKenna ruled that the Catholic Care charity was ” a well-respected voluntary adoption agency which has made a significant contribution to the provision of adoption services in this country and facilitated many successful adoption placements”, but she and two colleagues said the charity’s activities would be unlawful if it went on refusing to accept gay adoptive parents.

21 Responses to “Adoption rights for gays is tantamount to â€˜child abuse’, says the Catholic Church”

As someone who is the only heterosexual person in our 3 person department at work. I see first hand the effects of anti-homosexual policies, both in and out of religion.

It infuriates me that these organizations such as the RCC want to have their ability to discriminate protected from discrimination. I'm not sure what works me up more, the hypocrisy itself or their ignorance to it.

I had to sit for several minutes collecting my thoughts on this one, bearing in mind the most recent child abuse scandals by the catholic church, and also it's long well documented history of such things. I can only conclude that this is part of a campaign by these old perverts to trivialise child abuse, I believe their goal is to desensitise us to the issue until 'child abuse' becomes a trendy catch phrase for the masses.

'Bring your children to sunday school, after all it's tantamount to child abuse if you don't!'

I do try to be a live and let live sort of person, but I struggle with visions of these perverts riding ducking stools and clergy fueled bonfires, every time I think about the harm these despicable men have caused to countless children.

Strange for a cult so well-know for its plethora of dirty old paedophile bastards – that they are fighting tooth and nail to be alllowed to hate and spread lies and prejudice against a minority.

Beggars belief it does – their absolute lack of self awareness.

For a celibate organisation, they have an unhealthly obsession for interfering in the sexuality of others – never mind contributing to the deaths of millions in africa with their idiotic backwards logic regarding safe-sex.

Well it is the catholic church, if they know anything it is how to abuse children. So I suggest a compromise, we let homosexuals adobt children, but only if they prove that they never have been catholic.

For about 2.000 years Christians have had things their way, often using violence. A few weeks ago a report about child abuse and the way this was handled/covered up for years by the RC Church shows that this organisation is no position to give comments on this, if not all, subjects. Some gays may not make the kind of parent a child needs, but the same goes for straights; just read the statistics on child abuse.

A few years ago it was the militant feminists who refused to accept that women were capable of abusing children (or of abusing men, for that matter). Now we have the religionists who, in defiance of an absolute mountain of evidence, are refusing to accept that heterosexual people – and often very religious to boot – are the main abusers of children! How odd!!

Facts and evidence? I shall put my fingers in my ears and shout "lalalalalala" until the evidence disappears! We demand unquestioning obedience to undecipherable texts written thousands of years ago by men in totally different cultures with absolutely no understanding of science, facts, or evidence! I phetoow on your "study" with its logic and evidence! My dogma is the One True Path and no amount of evidence or facts will convince me otherwise!

This is more like the pot calling the microwave black. Using the kettle would imply there is some parity to the relative rates of abuse of children between the two groups, which is not the case. I wonder if there is any profession with a higher percentage of child molesters than catholic priest? I doubt it.

[…] RELIGION: Catholic church at it again: Says adoption rights for gays is tantamount to â€˜child abuse… The Vatican is actually instructing people in California to break the law and discriminate against homosexual couples, stating: "allowing children to be adopted by persons living in [homosexual] unions would actually mean doing violence to these childrenâ€ as defamatory in nature and â€œabsolutely unacceptable to the citizenry of San Francisco." […]